Yes, it's true that many players grudgingly accepted the tenders. You, apparently, are seriously trying to imply that those who signed the tenders under the threat of them being lowered actually wanted to go that route.
See, this sort of positioning by you is why this discussion would be a waste of time.
Of course they didn't want to go that route. It's human nature to prefer long term security and tens of millions more than to be faced with the cold hard reality that life isn't always fair... It sucks to be a player with 4-5-6 years of service on the eve of a lockout who is unable to reach free agency because of a rule that has existed in the CBA since it was first enacted in the 1990's...only you didn't realize that until a couple of months ago... Yup, the tradeoff of 2 years of FA for that highly touted uncapped year in the event either side blinked has been on the books since the present CBA (which has merely been extended with negotiated modifications in the 15+ years since was first ratified.
I didn't go to college on a football scholarship and it isn't even my job, but I knew this over a year ago and if it had been my job it impacted I'd have know it long before that...and being a realist I'd have opted to get the best deal I could under the circumstances, unless I already had tens of millions in the bank in which case I'd likely roll the dice on getting a better deal later on as opposed to settling for non guaranteed rolling guarantees...
One of the reasons football players have long been viewed as the ugly stepchildren of FA is because few of them ever bothered to get involved in their own contract and union dealings preferring to just mosey along like sheep led around by the nose by commission agents and the NFLPA. Heck, they still don't even get to elect their own union leader...
If you asked any of them or any retired player/analyst a year ago what the 30% rule meant or what reallocation was you'd be hard pressed to get a remotely coherent response, let alone one that was in the ballpark of accurate. I listen to them cavalierly ballaxe the cap on the radio and cringe. I read articles where paid mediots ballaxe the cap and contracts and rules of the CBA and cringe almost daily.
There is little point in anyone having a discussion with you beyond killing if not wasting time. On some level it's been that way since the day you arrived, only it's gotten worse over time as you've alienated almost everyone on multiple boards with your semantic hijacks and contrarian for contrarian sake pissing matches and smug, smarter than any of you homer dolts attitude. Miguel or Andy or I may not agree on lots of things. But whatever I know about the cap (or the desire to ever even grasp it) was born of arguments and discussions and disagreements we all had here back when Brady's last deal was being hammered out and we were all trying to determine what could, should or would result. The difference between then and now was it was an exercise in education for all of us in the final analysis, and we never sunk to name calling or labeling or drawing lines in the sand just to piss at each other across them. With the possible exception of NEM and a couple of knuckleheads, it was a much friendlier and respectful place to be than it is today. Hmm...what does that say.
